Forum:2018-11-09 (Friday)
Discussion for comic for . Genius is an infinite capacity for making edits. ---- Well, now we know what Dimo's up to... But who are those people? Not Violetta, I think. As for the rest of the page, panels 2 and 6 look like useful information; panels 1, 3, 4, 8, and 9 look like just humor; I can't quite decide about panel 7. Not that there will actually be a ghost, but there might turn out to be something behind his wall. And 5 might end up telling us that Tobber, as people have been speculating, was the "ghast," paying his debts. Bkharvey (talk) 05:16, November 9, 2018 (UTC) On second thought, panel 3 might be relevant if Tobber has been making his own pseudo-Jägerdraught. Bkharvey (talk) 05:22, November 9, 2018 (UTC) Another thought: The last panel would fit in with the others if Tobber killed whoever those people are, presumably because he knew they were responsible for the deaths of Smokes and Bunstable. Bkharvey (talk) 06:29, November 9, 2018 (UTC) Panel 9 does have a hint of usefulness as well; the terrifying abomination partially hidden behind the speech bubble looks a lot like the thing menacing the time bubble in Mechanicsburg. Jagerdraught Braumeister (talk) 14:11, November 9, 2018 (UTC) The corpses belong to Dr. Crisp and Dr. Henkle. Autoch (talk) 15:43, November 9, 2018 (UTC) : Oh, good eye! And good memory. I couldn't recognize Dr. Crisp even with that information, but Dr. Henkle is quite recognizable by the gold panel on his forehead. I suppose the idea is that Tobber had to kill them so they couldn't report that the remains aren't him. Sad, though, since otherwise he doesn't seem to have done anything but pay his debts. Bkharvey (talk) 16:12, November 9, 2018 (UTC) :: Very good spotting indeed, Autoch. I'm sure you're right, especially since the room they're in looks as if it could be a medical examiner's lab. -- William Ansley (talk) 16:05, November 10, 2018 (UTC) Transdimensional lenses? Why not call them Chekhov's Gun, & be done with it? Hmmm.... Bosda Di'Chi (talk) 18:27, November 9, 2018 (UTC) Okay, so let's say all this is Tobber's doing. Why did he do all that? The gifts have the feel of a Last Will and Testament, as if he knows he'll die soon. But why fake his death first? Hypothesis: He drank a concoction made of those solvents in panel 3, and it turned him into some sort of monster that would freak everyone out. In particular, let's say he's lost the power of speech. And he knows he's dying, because the transformation was unstable. So, does he have a specific goal in mind, other than advancing science? Can he live inside a wall? (He would also have to be able to flow through the 2x4s that hold the wall up.) Is he even still alive? And, does he know anything about the bad guys? (If he can live inside a wall, he could spy on them.) But if he knows he's about to die, why would he care about the autopsy proving the body Smokes found isn't his? Maybe instead of being on the verge of death, he's merely lost the spark, so he has to give his work to other sparks who can continue it. He might intend to live on, as an agent of good. (If he were a bad guy, he would have given his notes to someone like Steelgarter or Eyeball.) Bkharvey (talk) 00:15, November 10, 2018 (UTC) P.S. The guy in panel 5 is from some other cartoon, but I can't remember which. Can anyone help? Bkharvey (talk) 00:18, November 10, 2018 (UTC) P.P.S. Nobody has a British sigil visible except panel 9's doll lady. Panel 3 has a sigil with only vertical lines. Panels 1, 2, 6, and 7 have visible apparently-blank sigils. The others are obscured by their arms or something. Bkharvey (talk) 00:25, November 10, 2018 (UTC) Hey, maybe he turned into an octopus! That would make panel 1 relevant. And perhaps he can only spend a short time out of the water, just long enough for one book delivery or whatever. So if we accept that panel 9 shows a time-traveler, that just leaves 4 and 8 irrelevant -- which leads me to suspect we'll find meanings for those, too. Bkharvey (talk) 04:21, November 10, 2018 (UTC) Duh, I'm stupid. Doll lady in panel 9 is holding an octopus-like but sapient monster, yog-yoggerunt. That's what Tobber turned into! Maybe she experimented on him, instead of him experimenting on himself. Bkharvey (talk) 04:30, November 10, 2018 (UTC) At least two of the people on this page also appeared on the page I in Wednesday's forum, the one from Ariadne's party showing many characters talking about Tobber. The guy from panel 6 of today's page appeared in panel 4 of that page. The guy with a "lightbulb" coming out of the top of his head in panel 7 appears in panel 7 of that page as well. And before Fred1740 can chime in again, I don't really have a point in mentioning this, except I find it very interesting that Phil Foglio, the "Emperor of one-shot characters" (at least in this comic), chose to reuse some of them in this storyline after five or six months of "real time" have elapsed and that Cheyenne Wright also colored them consistently in each appearance. It isn't unprecedented in Girl Genius, but I don't recall it happening very often. -- William Ansley (talk) 16:42, November 10, 2018 (UTC) : And before Bkharvey can chime in, no, I don't think it is significant that "light bulb head" appeared in panel 7 both times. ;-) -- William Ansley (talk) 17:02, November 10, 2018 (UTC) :: Hey! Have I ever suggested that it mattered which panel someone was in? I just post panel numbers as the easiest and least ambiguous way to refer to the content of a panel. P.S. What do you (or anyone) think about my theory that Tobber is now a yog-yoggerunt? Bkharvey (talk) 17:57, November 10, 2018 (UTC) ::: I'm afraid I find it far fetched. I think you are trying to spin an elaborate theory by taking what the Foglios intend as no more than humor (including humorous references to geek pop culture, such as the Cthulhu mythos) much too seriously. However, I will be glad to be the first to congratulate you if you turn out to be right. -- William Ansley (talk) 20:19, November 10, 2018 (UTC) :::: As Jagerdraught Braumeister said up above, the one she's holding isn't important, it's the one on the shelf behind her that looks like the Thing reaching towards Mechanicsburg. --Geoduck42 (talk) 00:27, November 11, 2018 (UTC) ::::: They could both be important, couldn't they? But "he stole all my shoes" really isn't that funny, unless it turns out to be related to neo-Tobber. Bkharvey (talk) 00:42, November 11, 2018 (UTC)